Probably the best known of these was the Wilson Line that ran from the foot of Chestnut street in Philadelphia down to Chester, Pennsgrove, and on to Wilmington, Delaware.  The Wilson people opened an amusement park called Riverview Park, in Pennsville, and the boats stopped at the wharf there, too.  That route gave winter service.  Wilmington families rode up the Delaware to Philadelphia in the morning to shop and they returned home in the evening the same day.

The Wilson Line was a large corporation with passenger boats all along the East Coast.  In May, 1929, the Senior Class of the Haddonfield High School on its annual Washington trip, traveled to Mt Vernon by trolley from the Capitol and returned to the City via the Potomac River on a Wilson Line boat.

The old Ericson Line operated overnight boats in both directions from Chestnut street in Philadelphia to Baltimore.  The route was down the Delaware River to the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, and down the Chesapeake Bay to Baltimore.  The canal was much narrower in an earlier era and the two banks were very close to the boat as it glided through.

The fare was 80 cents one way and state rooms were available but unnecessary since sleeping in the lounge on sofas and chairs was allowed.  A fabulous dinner in the dining room could be secured for $1 and a huge breakfast the next morning cost 35 cents.

Try that now!

The trip began in Philadelphia the afternoon and finished the next morning in Baltimore.

There was a ferry line once on the Delaware that ran from Philadelphia to Trenton.  It had stops at Burlington and Bristol and also had a wharf at an amusement park that was built on an island.  It was called Burlington Island Park.

As autos, buses, trains and airplanes extended the horizons of the public, the ferry excursions to comparatively nearby points of amusement and relaxation gradually faded from the scene, but that slower pace must have been very enjoyable.

Many Haddonfield families often took the children on those popular Delaware River excursion boat rides up and down the river and visited the amusement parks along the way during a part of their summer vacations.

Reminising with Ben Jasper, a former Haddonfield resident now residing in Baltimore, brought about this column.